


i found

by grimscribbler



Category: RWBY
Genre: Character Study, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Reunions, Spoilers: Volume 5 (RWBY)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-26
Updated: 2019-03-26
Packaged: 2019-12-18 10:57:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,687
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18248447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/grimscribbler/pseuds/grimscribbler
Summary: it’s the point of contactthat cracks the ice overmy spine.One-shot character study for Weiss during Volume 5, because she is my queen and she is Soft.Comments and kudos appreciated!





	i found

**Author's Note:**

> Wrote this over a three night insomnia kick, I hope it makes sense cause I was kinda delirious writing it lol 
> 
> #letnorasayfuck2k19

Weiss wasn't sure of anything anymore.  
  
She knew a year ago, the idea of being unsure would've been baffling. In her father's eyes and her own, an uncertain Schnee was a weak Schnee. Before the Fall, she had been a wall of resolution. Firm in who she was and what she would become. Heir to the Schnee Dust Company, intent on taking back her family's name.  
  
Now, a year after abandoning Beacon and the memories laid in its soil, all of her motions were made with hesitation. She was filled with uncertainty, as if all of her confidence had been stripped away. Confidence that lied in her title as heiress, her team, and her freedom. All of it was stripped away from her in an instant.  
  
What was left behind in the carnage? A skeleton of a girl who forgot she was supposed to be made of ice, her frozen heart melted by love. Her father would have named her a fool, but she knew better now. Her team had taught her to know which thoughts were hers and which thoughts were _his_ , and she would forever be grateful to them for that.  
  
She knew she wasn't whole anymore, but she still had pieces of herself left. It was just a matter of putting herself back together. Fitting the shattered shards against each other and stitching them to resemble a person. Bit by bit she became Weiss again - but it was not without flaws.  
  
Barring the scar over her eye, she now carried three more, hidden beneath her skin. She had frosted her heart to survive her return to Schnee Manor, but each missing piece still burned like a new wound. It took her a bit to realise that her soul had been changed. Ticking powerfully in her chest, her heart was a machine built out of three other pieces. Three other cogs created out of burning gold, shadowed violet, and a blood red rose.  
  
Gods, she missed them.  
  
She missed them _so much_.  
  
Weiss ached to be back in her room at Beacon. She would dream of the quiet creak of ropes as Ruby tossed in her sleep, the soft whisper of pages turning from Blake's bunk, Yang singing in the shower without a care. Schnee Manor was large enough to house the Atlesian military for a day, but she'd grown accustomed to cramped quarters. Her room was far too big, the bed too empty and open. Her head wasn't right, filled with worry and longing for her team.  
  
Locked away in a palace with walls high enough to be a prison.  
  
However infuriating her return had been, she kept her anger tempered. Held at bay by a crushing sense of loss. She'd taken to wandering the familiar halls with all the longing of a caged bird, passing statues that made the scar over her eye throb quietly. She would sit in the courtyard, gazing up at the overcast blue-gray skies of Atlas, wishing they were a specific shade of silver.  
  
Months passed, and she kept herself busy. Biding her time, waiting for news from Anima. Klein kept her updated, and kept her sane. She had no idea what sign she was looking for, only that she needed to wait for the right moment.  
  
Fencing was a good passtime, when her father was away on business. He hated to watch her train, hated to see the semblance he could never possess. She preferred to train as much as possible, and it kept her skills sharp. Between training, she found herself in the courtyard, writing songs about the Fall, of sacrifice and aching loss. After a particularily horrible meeting with her father, she furiously vented onto the paper like it had personally wronged her.  
  
Six months passed, then two more. She was asked to preform a concert for charity, donating to Beacon. How could she refuse?  
  
It was a toss up when she chose her final song for the concert. To rebel, or to mourn? Klein visited her room the night before, an article pulled up on his scroll. Her own scroll was heavily monitored by her father, but Klein was more than happy to show her the news.  
  
"Atlas military called to support Haven in dire times..." Weiss read aloud, voice trailing off as her crystal blue eyes snapped up to her butler. "That means..."  
  
"Your sister is in Haven." He said, grinning into his mustache. His red eyes reminded her fondly of another pair she missed, but this time the ache came with hope.  
  
"I have a favor to ask, Klein." Weiss whispered, her knuckles turning paler around the edges of the scroll.  
  
"Anything for you my little snowflake." He said, eyes flickering to a soft warm blue.  
  
"Do you happen to know any pilots?"  


* * *

  
After the fiasco at the charity ball, Weiss' patience had finally run dry. Two weeks later and training all day every day, she finally got word from Klein.  
  
It was time.  
  
The night she snuck through the cramped library passageway, she could almost feel her team laughing and cheering her on with each step. At the end of the tunnel, Weiss breached the freezing air of Atlas, and breathed in the scent of freedom for the first time in almost a year. She glanced up at the sky, grinning wide as the crumbling silver eye seemed to wink at her.  
  
She had a good feeling about this.  
  
Which, had rapidly evaporated when her ship crashed onto the coast.  
  
Being kidnapped and living in a much filthier prison for a whole week, Weiss wondered if she was still trying to pay her karmic debt. Before-Beacon Weiss had been horribly pompous and rude, sometimes she felt like she was still trying to atone for her past behavior.

Her thoughts aside, she found that the craziest thing was how she preferred the bandit's rudementary bars and dirt floor over the Schnee Family Manor.  
  
At least this prison didn't try to pretend to be something it wasn't.  
  
She was leaning on one of the unconfortable rusted bars watching her captors drink themselves into a stupor, when there was a commotion at the front of the camp. She sat up, attentive as her guards fumbled over themselves and ran to see what was happening.  
  
_This is my chance!_  
  
Quickly, she turned and summoned her little knight, nodding at him with a grin. He started hacking away at the bars, pale blue mist bursting from his joints with each swing.  
  
She heard anxious murmuring behind her, but her concentration filtered it into background noise. Well, until the tent blocking her from the camp suddenly dropped from a body flinging into it. Caught, Weiss whipped around - only to blink dumbly at the radiant gold mane framing an achingly familiar face.  
  
" _Weiss??_ "  
  
Quickly shaking her head, Weiss collected herself and shrugged. She stood, her joints cracking in protest. "Well, I guess subtly is out."  
  
The shadow of her knight stretched out behind her, the cage snapping and screeching in protest. Forcing her feet to remain steady, she booked it to Yang's side, the ground shaking as her knight followed.  
  
"What are _you_ doing here??" Yang asked, baffled.  
  
"I could ask you the same thing!" She snipped, glaring at her two guards now trying not to cower in the face of her massive construct.  
  
"Well this is my mom's camp, I came to find Ruby." Yang replied, her foot shifting in gravel as she slid into her fighting stance. She needed no words to sense the danger they were in.  
  
Weiss' eyes lingered on the new yellow and black prosthetic for only a second, noting the small gun port emerging from her wrist. Then Yang's words crashed back into her skull with the force of an Ursa, her head whipping around the the woman clad in black and red. She'd only seen her once or twice in the entire week she'd been stuck in the camp, but her Grimm mask still gave her chills.  
  
"Your Mother had me kidnapped??" She blurted out, aghast.  
  
Yang's eyes erupted with red as she whirled on her mother. Weiss couldn't help the grin inching across her face at the familiar sight. "You  _kidnapped_  her??"  
  
The following conversation was just as confusing, but Weiss had reached a point of inner calm with herself. Yang's presence had clicked her goals back into view, one of her soul's missing pieces shuddering back into place.

She threw herself at Yang when Raven disappeared into her tent, tears brimming the corners of her eyes as she felt the cool pressure of Yang's prosthetic on the back of her hair. Her natural warmth enveloped the heiress, and she couldn't remember the last time she'd felt this safe. Certainly before Beacon.

Though, she knew they couldn't stay wrapped in a healing hug forever. Yang pulled away first, blinking back the gloss in her lilac eyes. She was more stoic than Weiss remembered, and she had to wonder what kind of journey Yang had to make in order to end up here.

"Well, are you ready to find Ruby?" Yang asked, turning to the tent with a glare.

Weiss' eyes turned glacial, a smirk on her face as she picked up Myrtenaster, swiping the dirt off on her ruined skirt. "I've  _been_ ready."

They entered the tent together, and and hour later, left it in confusion. By the end of Raven's explaination and 'magic trick', Weiss could feel a headache blooming right behind her left eye, her scar throbbing in tandem.

Yang had rolled Bumblebee behind Raven's tent, her words clipped and containing bite to them that made Weiss oddly proud. Now perched atop the back of Yang's death trap (bike), she felt a sudden wave of exhaustion sweep through her bones.

She could feel Yang's heat seeping into her chest, and all she wanted to do was sleep for a solid year. Yang heartbeat was an anxious rhythm against her ear, the pulse pounding through her stomach and against Weiss' palms in a staccato.

"You weren't kind this time either." And still, she addressed her mother with a frosty tone that rivaled Weiss' own. The bike revved beneath them.  
  
Honestly, the heiress was impressed. Yang had kept a relatively good handle on her emotions, even if she seemed...colder, as a result. She couldn't tell if the shift had been brought on by Yang's injury, or by her mother's presence.

The condescending tone in that woman's voice - Weiss had stayed silent out of politeness (Raven wasn't her battle to wage), but she didn't blame her teammate for flipping the table over.  
  
They slowly rolled through the wall of red. Her vision bled for a moment, before she blinked and suddenly they were high in the mountains. Her ears screamed for relief from the sudden altitude change, but a quick yawn and the resounding pop brought instant relief.  
  
" _Oh_...!"  
  
That gravelly rasp wasn't very familiar. Weiss peaked over Yang's broad shoulder, her blue eyes widening at the dishevelled sight of Qrow. A bit of residual indignation for her sister's humiliating resurfaced, but she reigned it in with practiced ease.  
  
Her old self liked to resurface sometimes, barking angrily at people like a pissed off chihuahua. All it took was a small tug to shake herself of the reaction. She hadn't seen Qrow in over a year, but she remembered distinctly how much he seemed to care about Ruby as she clung to his arm. Seeing him with the vast misty mountains laid out behind him, Weiss couldn't help the thrill vibrating up her spine.  
  
Ruby had to be close.  


* * *

  
Weiss stepped through the door of the safe house, shaking in her blue platform heels. Not even Yang's reassuring warmth and smile could asuade the sudden panic coursing through her veins.  
  
Qrow said he'd been travelling with Ruby for weeks. Their team leader was only moments from them, on the other side of the safehouse door. She'd expected there to be a grace period where she could recover from the day of emotional whiplash she'd endured - only to find out there was one more shoe to drop. She could hear the chime of Ruby's squeaky voice in the other room, and Weiss' hands felt like they were made of ice.  
  
She glanced down, horrified to find the beginning revolutions of a blue glyph forming under her feet. She quickly shut off her semblance, sharply looking up at the sound of shattering pottery.  
  
Her heart felt like it too had been dropped on the floor with the scattered tea.  
  
Ruby was taller than she remembered. Her body was starting to fill out the corsets she always wore, shapes and curves rather than adolescent angles. Her hair was still tipped with crimson, and her cloak was tattered, but still there. The only thing missing was her smile, and that broke Weiss' heart more than anything that could have changed in a year.  
  
Ruby's silver eyes had grown misty with tears, her hands shaking as she brought them to her lips. Her eyes darted left and right, quiet, subdued stammers leaving her with uncertainty. It made her heart ache in a way she couldn't comprehend, to see her best friend so afraid and tortured. It took everything in Weiss' power not to stride over to Ruby and hold her. She held back, because as emotionally overwhelmed as she was, she knew this wasn't her time. Yang was already moving.  
  
Ruby's shoulders had curled in towards her chest, sobs sticking in her throat.  
  
"I-I'm sorry, Yang, I never should have left w-without you and I know I -"  
  
Yang shook her head, tears at the corners of her eyes as she wrapped her sister in a tender hug, cutting off her words.  
  
"I love you." Yang said, her voice thick with tears. "I should've said that months ago Rubes, you have nothing to apologize for."  
  
Ruby's gaze blanked out for a second, staring over Yang's shoulder and looking right through Weiss. The fencer couldn't look away, even as her heart crumbled like the moon as Ruby's expression suddenly deteriorated into full blown sobs. Her eyes disappeared into Yang's shoulder, wrenching howls muffled by her sister's clothes as they clung to each other for dear life.  
  
A few minutes passed - Yang was murmuring in her ear quietly, Ruby's two-toned head nodding as she calmed down. Weiss fidgeted with her hands the entire time, breath catching in her throat as she spotted team JNR hovering near the kitchen, soft smiles on their faces.  
  
"Weiss."  
  
Her attention snapped to the siblings immediately, both of them looking to her expectantly with arms open. Ruby's grin had returned, and it was even more beautiful than she remembered. She didn't waste another moment, sprinting to them with sobs and laughter sticking to her tongue.  
  
She threw her arms around them with such enthusiasm she knocked heads with Ruby, though their auras protected them from the worst of it. Ruby didn't seem to care, Yang's longer reach engulfing the both of them in the smell of lilacs and brimstone. Weiss and Ruby laughed, burrowing into the taller girl's warmth with all they had.  
  
It hurt in the best way possible.  
  
Weiss was so happy to be home.  


* * *

  
She demanded a shower as soon as the emotions had died down, quite aware of how bad a week in bandit prison could make someone smell. Yang also admitted that she wanted a shower, much to Ruby's dismay. They promised they could all catch up afterwards, which seemed to placate her for the most part.

Ruby let her borrow a deep red long sleeve shirt that fell to her thighs, and a pair of loose black pajama pants with white roses that were just a bit too long. She was forced to roll them up to her ankles, which she did only after she tripped and nearly killed herself in the hallway. Her pride was dented, but she'd been prepared to lose it anyway by borrowing her partner's clothes.

She emerged from the shower feeling much more human, her massive pile of hair pulled up into an elaborate bun. There was no one in the hallway, but the scent of roses clung to the back of her throat still. She sniffed the red shirt, confirming the sweet smell's origin. Weiss felt odd wearing something vastly outside her color scheme. Not bad odd, just...a funny sort of odd. Like maybe she shouldn't have been this comfortable in something that wasn't hers. Burying those thoughts for Tomorrow Weiss to deal with, she shuffled out into the main room. Upon entry she was immediately subjected to cooing from Nora and a damp haired Yang.  
  
A shiver worked its way to the base of her skull, ignoring Yang and Nora completely as she made eye contact with Ruby. Her partner's eyes had blown wide, lips parted ever so slightly in surprise. The odd feeling returned full force, manifesting in pins and needles along the surface of her skin. They held eye contact for only a split second, though it seemed to stretch for hours. One of them blinked, Weiss didn't know which.  
  
Spell broken, the world suddenly converged back to normal. Everyone started moving into the kitchen, Ruby's shy gaze lingering on Weiss before following Jaune into the next room.  
  
Weiss' mouth felt like a desert, heart palpitating in her ears.  
  
What the _hell_  was that?  
  
She frowned, glancing down at her clothes and picking at the red shirt, wondering about the expression on Ruby's face. Nora called for her from the other room, startling her out of her thoughts. Whatever it was, it was a problem for tomorrow Weiss. Today Weiss only wanted food, and company that didn't speak about statistics, or murder. She wasn't sure she'd be free of that last one.  
  
They caught up over noodles, which, after a week of smarmy prison food, Weiss all but inhaled. While they ate, Ruby, Jaune, and Nora recounted the geist incident.  
  
"So there we were, this fucking rock monster had to have been taller than a skyscraper-!"  
  
"It was pretty tall, but only about the size of a three story building."  
  
"Jaune danced in front of it to distract it -"  
  
"Hey! I was running, thank you very much! Dancing is unprofessional."  
  
"Yeah yeah, can it diva. I know how you get with dance numbers - AH don't even look at me like that Jaune, you know it's true! _Aaa_ anyway. Ruby and I swooped in, hero style, and we made this _Ca-RAY-zey_ lightning spiral thing with her semblance-"  
  
"It was really cool Weiss, you should've seen it!"  
  
"Wait I'm not done!!"  
  
"Oops, sorry Nora."  
  
"Man. What's a girl gotta do 'round here to get some respect for proper storytelling!"  
  
"Have a proper story to tell, and try exaggerating less." Weiss said, sarcasm lacing her words as she dabbed her lips with a napkin daintily.  
  
"Oof, Ice Queen still has her frostbite!" Nora crowed.  
  
Yang reached over and immediately high-fived her, a softly hissed, "Nice!" Shared between them.  
  
Weiss couldn't find it in her to hate the name, far too happy to finally be around the people she loved. She settled for a weak roll of her eyes, saying with bridled amusement, "I _so_ didn't miss that name."  
  
Yang and Nora gasped, "Oh my gods she _likes_  it!"  
  
Weiss rolled her eyes again, harder, but ended with her gaze landing on her partner. Ruby was quiet now, but she still held a bright, mega-watt smile on her face. As Yang and Nora yelled about things she could barely make out, Weiss leaned into Ruby's side, bumping their shoulders together gently.  
  
"Hey." She said softly, far more gentle than she expected to come from her mouth. Even Ruby looked surprised by it, causing a pink tinge to paint her pale cheeks. "Um... how're you holding up?"  
  
Ruby laughed, though her voice sounded a bit strained. "Oh, y'know. Fighting Grimm, trying not to die. Keepin' everyone together. The usual."  
  
Weiss' tongue clicked against the roof of her mouth, gently shoving Ruby's knee as she took a page out of her sister Winter's book.  
  
"I meant how are You doing you dunce, not your job. Are you eating properly? Are you taking care of yourself?"  
  
Ruby's laughter seemed freer this time, her shoulders relaxing. "Yep! I brush my teeth, I mouthwash when I can't, And I still eat twice my weight in food. I'm good!"  
  
Weiss allowed a soft smile to grow on her face, knowing there was more they needed to talk about, but bolstered in the knowledge that it could wait. Her partner paused, smile matching Weiss'.  
  
"How've you been, Weiss?" Ruby asked warmly, sitting up to immitate the ex-heiress' naturally perfect posture.  
  
"Tired." She replied with the first word on her mind, hastily continuing, "Tired, but finally okay. I just...I needed to get back to this. To... (to you, to the team, to being someone I want to be) To ah...not Atlas. I realised that it...it isn't for me anymore."  
  
She glanced at the now cold cup of coffee in front of her, a bit of pink touching her cheeks. She felt a calloused, smooth hand wrap around her own, and the pink on her pale cheeks darkened. Crystalline blue met gunmetal silver, silver eyes crinkled happily at the corners.  
  
"Well you're stuck with us now." Ruby said quietly, as if sharing a secret. "I'm not gonna leave your side again, Weiss."  
  
Her tone turned playful, squeezing Weiss' hand and saying loftily, "That's just how it has to be now. Sorry, I don't make the rules."  
  
A bubble of laughter spilled from the heiress' lips, squeezing Ruby's hand under the table as she fought the urge to sink into her partner's side like a cat seeking warmth. Her heart was full, and even though they were still missing one last piece of their group, Weiss was content with what she had for the moment. Ruby's fingers laced with her own, two calloused palms pressing into each other. Two halves of a broken four-cog clock finally clicking together.  
  
Reunited.


End file.
